WEBINAR: COVID-19 response ensuring food security in Asia

19 May 2020. WEBINAR EXTENSION AND ADVISORY SERVICES (EAS): at frontline of COVID-19 response ensuring food security in Asia 

Recognising that the impact of COVID-19 and response measures are not uniform across the globe, FAO’s Research and Extension Unit is organizing a series of webinars to discuss the role EAS in the context of the pandemic in different regions.

• To download the recording and the presentations, please click on the link below.
• https://we.tl/t-svAsNo5lBc

This first webinar focused on the Asia region and:

• Explored and discussed the potential roles of EAS actors in providing essential services to the rural population in a short and medium term including socio-economic recovery;
• Shared experiences of key measures that EAS actors are undertaking by adapting their capacity, activities, and operational mechanism to effectively respond to COVID-19.
• Highlighted specific country examples from China, India and Lao People’s Democratic Republic and responses to overcome challenges of COVID-19 impact and related measures.

Presentations:

• Extension and Advisory Services (EAS): at frontline of COVID-19 response ensuring food security – challenges and adaptations needed
• Private advisory services to smallholder farmers for marketing perishable agro-products by E-commence strategy to mitigate impact of COVID-19 in China
• Remote consultation and digital services to smallholder farmers on crop pest monitoring and control in case of COVID-19 pandemic in Sichuan province of China
• Using Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) tools to support farmers with technical advice and marketing support during Covid-19 in India
• Could COVID-19 crisis be a turning point for youth in agriculture, and what are the implication for rural advisory services in Lao People’s Democratic Republic?

Speakers:

• Ms. Nan Bai, PinDuoDuo e-commerce platform, China. It is China’s second largest e-commerce platform based on their users and order numbers. With its existing network and infrastructure, PDD could quickly roll out measures in response to Covid-19 to help farmers sell their produce rapidly at better prices while providing much-needed resources such as training and farming supplies.
• Mr. Zhang Mei, Senior agronomist at Plant Protection Station of Sichuan Provincial Department of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, China. He has 14 years of experience in agriculture extension, has done a lot of technical research and application promotion in green prevention and control of crop diseases and insect pests, integrated control, application of new pesticides and new drugs and devices. 
• Dr. Rasheed Sulaiman V, the Director of Centre for Research on Innovation and Science Policy (CRISP) at Hyderabad, India. Dr. Rasheed worked as Senior Scientist with the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) at the ICAR- National Institute for Agricultural Economics and Policy Research at New Delhi. Dr. Rasheed is a member of the Board of GFRAS (Global Forum for Rural Advisory Services) and he coordinates the AESA (Agricultural Extension in South Asia) Network.
• Mr. Souvanthong Namvong, Deputy Head of the Division for Agriculture Information and National Project Director for Lao Upland Rural Advisory Services, Department of Technical Extension and Agro-Processing (DTEAP), Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry (MAF).
• Dr. Delgermaa Chuluunbaatar, Agricultural Extension Officer, FAO
• Mr. Sridhar Dharmapuri, Senior Food Safety and Nutrition Officer and Group Leader of the Agriculture and Food Systems Team at the FAO Regional Office for the Asia-Pacific in Bangkok, Thailand